With their Hawaiian shirts filled with protruding bellies, the crowd at
Avalon looked more like an indoor Parrothead convention than fans for one
of America’s greatest musical geniuses. Once the lights went down and Sir
Brian and his 11-piece band emerged from the wings, however, all that
mattered was the music.
Seated behind a rarely used keyboard and flanked by a pair of troublesome
teleprompters, Wilson appeared gaunt but energized with his coiffed hair,
wild gesticulations and ejaculated intermezzos. Surrounded by a gaggle of
talented multi-instrumentalists whose repertoire included banks of
keyboards, banjos, brass and even a “Hooter,” Wilson let his lyrics emerge
slowly and somewhat timidly from his jowls. The subtly conducted melodic
parfaits of “Home on the Range” were a bit cracked and a spoken “Sail On
Sailor” was a bit “uninspired” (to quote itself), but had a back beat that
was not to be denied. Using “Good Timin’” as a tribute to his “deceased
brother Carl” gave the song a new air, but “California Girls” had all the
bounce and magic it has always had. The sudden fadeouts of the
refreshingly brief songs reminded the audience of the age of LPs,
especially the jukebox hot Dance on the Spot” with its sizzling solos and
cruising rhythms. Requesting a show of lighters for its own sake, Wilson
elicited many more throughout the night through such fan favorites as the
lushly-layered “Blues Melt Away” and the Gregorian falsetto-fest that is
“Heroes and Villains.” “Surf’s Up” was filled with mumbly poetry yet still
lit up the stage with a curtain of blue stars that twinkled like Wilson’s
sagging eyes.
Ending part one of the night with his “personal favorite,” the pure rock
of “Hey, Marcella,” Wilson and the band quickly returned for a complete
and in-order run through of Pet Sounds. Bouncinginto “Wouldn’t It be
Nice?,” Brian and the boys (lower case ”b”) sailed through the
grandfatherly reminiscence of “Sloop John B” and started Macca’s favorite,
“God Only Knows” twice, letting a French Horn solo ring through the
hangar-like hall, perhaps for the first time. “Hang On To Your Ego” was a
schizophrenic psycho-harmonic warning and “I Wasn’t Made for These Times”
was still telling and true.
Closing part two with a “lovely” “Caroline, No,” the band emerged twice
more for a series of greatest hits encores that included an orange-sweet
“Good Vibrations,” waves of “Surfer Girl” and a T-Rex-y “Do It Again” that
had the crowd nearly banging gongs for more.